One criticism of lightning that I’ve seen come up pretty frequently is the fear that most users won’t run their own nodes, with the assumption that running a lightning node means a dedicated always-on server (raspberry pi, desktop pc, VPS).
And consequently a fear of centralisation over time.
However, unless I’m missing something, aren’t wallets like Breez and Phoenix already running ‘real’ nodes on mobile?
Users retain the keys to their own channels with these mobile wallets, correct?
So long as those keys can be verified (and perhaps current implementations don’t allow this well enough), user funds are secure?
They are attempting to run a full LN node/wallet in a browser. Apple's App Store has been moving in the direction of wanting their cut of all monetary exchanges. Recently Coinbase wallet has halted transfer of NFTs due to Apple wanting a cut of gas fees, which isn't really possible since Apple is only interested in receiving USD. Anyway, the Duopoly of Google's Play Store and Apple's App Store is a possible vector of censorship that may be circumvented by a browser wallet.